A LONGGANG District court ordered a man about 50 years old to visit his 82-year-old mother at least once a week in a Tuesday ruling on the mother’s lawsuit against the son over his cold attitudes toward her.

    It was the Longgang court’s first case of a parent suing a son or daughter for a lack of filial responsibility since a law intended to protect the rights of the elderly took effect earlier this year.

    The son, surnamed Li, was unhappy with the sentence and has filed an appeal at Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court, local media reported.

    The mother, surnamed Liu, was born in 1931 in a village in Ailian community, Longgang. She and her husband had one son and five daughters.

    According to traditional customs, Liu and her husband lived together with their son, Li, in a house in Ailian.

    In 2008, Liu left a will, leaving her shares of the house and the community cooperative company to Li.

    After her husband died in 2011, Liu still lived with Li, but on different floors.

    Family members said Liu and Li’s wife did not get along well, so Liu’s relationship with Li also struggled.

    Although they lived in the same building, Liu said she had to do everything on her own, except for cooking. Li brought three meals to her every day, but never asked whether she liked the meals or whether the meals were enough for her.

    “As an 80-year-old woman, I had to wash dishes and clothes and clean the apartment on my own. Li did not even send me to the hospital when I was ill, and just my daughters came to take care of me in turns. After I moved to my daughter’s home in April, Li never came to visit me or help with repairs around the home. I was very angry that he did not do his duty as a son, so I decided to sue him and asked him to see me at least once a week,” Liu said.

    Although many family members came to the court in hopes of persuading Li to spend more time with his mother, Li did not attend the hearings.

    The Longgang court said children should often visit and send support for the elderly, and it is their obligation to take care of aging parents. Not caring for one’s parents is against traditional Chinese morality and the law, the court said.

    (Wang Yuanyuan)